Drunk
How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization
Book Edition Details
Summary
"Drunk (2021) is a scientific and historical inquiry into the evolutionary reasons why humans started getting drunk. Drunk examines how inebriation helped our ancestors evolve into creative, communal, cultural beings, and considers whether or not alcohol is an appropriate tool for the modern age.\nIn the audio version of these blinks, you'll hear ""Also Sprach Zarathustra,"" composed by Richard Strauss, made available under a Creative Commons Attribution license by Kevin MacLeod. Thanks, Kevin! "
Introduction
Imagine walking into a bustling startup office where engineers huddle around whiteboards, sketching breakthrough algorithms while sipping craft beer from the company tap. The atmosphere buzzes with creative energy as colleagues who barely spoke during formal meetings now share bold ideas and forge unexpected partnerships. This scene, playing out in innovation hubs worldwide, reveals a profound truth we've forgotten: intoxication isn't humanity's weakness—it's one of our greatest evolutionary advantages. For millennia, humans have gathered around fermented beverages not merely for pleasure, but as essential technology for transcending our natural limitations. From ancient temple complexes where beer ceremonies united warring tribes to modern laboratories where controlled substances unlock creative breakthroughs, intoxication has quietly orchestrated our species' most remarkable achievements. Yet in our productivity-obsessed culture, we've lost sight of this fundamental reality: the capacity to deliberately alter our consciousness may be the very trait that separated us from other primates and launched us toward civilization. This book challenges everything you think you know about getting drunk, revealing it as humanity's oldest social technology—one that enhanced creativity, built trust, and enabled the large-scale cooperation that complex societies require. Through compelling stories spanning archaeology, neuroscience, and anthropology, you'll discover why every successful civilization has placed intoxicants at its cultural center, and how understanding this relationship can help us navigate the creative and collaborative challenges of our modern world.
Ancient Breweries and the Birth of Cooperation
At Göbekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey, archaeologists uncovered humanity's most puzzling achievement: massive stone temples built 11,000 years ago by hunter-gatherers who supposedly lacked the social organization for such monumental projects. These weren't simple shelters but sophisticated structures featuring intricately carved pillars weighing twenty tons each, requiring hundreds of people working in perfect coordination. The mystery deepened when researchers discovered enormous stone basins throughout the site—brewing vats capable of producing hundreds of gallons of fermented beverages. Chemical analysis of pottery fragments revealed the truth: these ancient people weren't just building monuments, they were throwing epic beer festivals that lasted for days. Scattered tribes from across the region would gather at Göbekli Tepe to drink, feast, and somehow coordinate the construction of humanity's first architectural marvels. The evidence suggests that alcohol production didn't follow agriculture—it preceded it. Our ancestors weren't farming to make bread; they were farming to make beer, driven by an intuitive understanding that fermented beverages possessed almost magical powers to transform suspicious strangers into cooperative communities. This discovery revolutionizes our understanding of human development. Modern neuroscience reveals why these ancient beer ceremonies were so effective: alcohol systematically suppresses the prefrontal cortex, temporarily disabling the brain regions responsible for anxiety, self-interest, and social inhibition. When rival tribal leaders shared fermented beverages, their cognitive defenses dropped, revealing genuine intentions and enabling the trust necessary for large-scale collaboration. These weren't primitive people stumbling into intoxication—they were sophisticated societies that recognized alcohol as essential infrastructure for human cooperation. The pattern repeats across every early civilization. Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets record detailed brewing recipes alongside the first legal codes. Ancient Chinese bronze vessels designed for wine ceremonies appeared with the earliest writing systems. Wherever complex societies emerged, alcohol was there first, laying the neurochemical foundation for everything that followed. These ancient brewers weren't just making drinks; they were engineering the social conditions necessary for civilization itself.
From Silicon Valley Bars to Creative Breakthroughs
In 1960s Silicon Valley, a mysterious figure named Al Hubbard quietly distributed pharmaceutical-grade LSD to engineers and entrepreneurs at major technology companies. The results were extraordinary: a wave of innovations that would reshape the modern world, from integrated circuits to personal computers. Steve Jobs later described his psychedelic experiences as among the most important of his life, crediting them with expanding his creative vision beyond conventional boundaries. This wasn't an anomaly but the continuation of an ancient pattern linking intoxication to human creativity. The symposiums of classical Greece, where philosophy and democracy were born, centered around carefully regulated wine consumption. Chinese poets of the Tang Dynasty produced their most celebrated works while drunk, believing alcohol revealed deeper truths about existence. Jazz musicians in 1920s Harlem used marijuana and alcohol to break free from musical conventions, creating entirely new art forms that continue to influence culture today. Modern research confirms what these creative communities intuited: moderate intoxication enhances divergent thinking by temporarily suppressing executive control systems in the brain. Studies show that people at a blood alcohol level of 0.08 percent significantly outperform sober individuals on creative problem-solving tasks, making unexpected connections and exploring ideas they'd normally dismiss as impractical. When Google maintains whiskey rooms for programmers facing creative blocks, they're applying ancient wisdom about the relationship between altered consciousness and innovation. The magic extends beyond individual creativity to collective breakthrough. When groups drink together, facial coding analysis reveals that genuine smiles become contagious, spreading through intoxicated groups far more readily than sober ones. Conversation patterns become more egalitarian, with natural turn-taking replacing hierarchical communication. The social barriers that normally prevent collaboration—status anxiety, cultural differences, professional competition—temporarily dissolve, allowing diverse minds to connect and create together in ways that reshape entire industries.
When Social Technology Becomes Personal Destruction
The same neurochemical systems that make alcohol humanity's most powerful social technology also contain the seeds of devastating personal destruction. When Russian economist Yegor Gaidar liberalized alcohol markets after the Soviet collapse, male life expectancy plummeted by over six years. The sudden availability of cheap vodka, combined with social isolation and economic despair, created a public health catastrophe that killed millions. This wasn't simply addiction—it was the dark side of our evolutionary relationship with intoxication unleashed without cultural safeguards. For most of human history, drinking was social, ritualized, and carefully regulated by community norms that maximized benefits while minimizing dangers. Ancient Chinese banquets featured elaborate protocols governing who could toast when and how much wine was appropriate. Greek symposiums had designated leaders who controlled the wine-to-water ratio and pacing of consumption. Traditional cultures worldwide developed sophisticated systems to harness alcohol's power for creativity and cooperation while preventing it from destroying individuals and families. Modern life has shattered these protective frameworks, replacing communal wine with solitary vodka, ritual consumption with binge drinking, and social regulation with individual willpower. The emergence of distilled spirits compounds the problem exponentially. For 99 percent of our history with alcohol, humans consumed beverages that were 2-4 percent alcohol by volume. Distillation created drinks that are 40-60 percent alcohol—a quantum leap in potency that our brains and cultures haven't adapted to handle safely. Yet the solution isn't prohibition, which history proves fails spectacularly, but rediscovering the wisdom of traditional drinking cultures. Mediterranean societies that emphasize wine and beer over spirits, integrate alcohol with food and social interaction, and teach moderation from an early age show dramatically lower rates of alcoholism despite high consumption. They've learned to domesticate this powerful technology, channeling its benefits for creativity and social bonding while preventing it from becoming a destructive force that tears apart the very communities it was meant to build.
Summary
The story of human civilization is inseparable from our relationship with intoxication, a profound truth that challenges modern assumptions about consciousness, creativity, and social connection. From the beer-fueled construction of humanity's first temples to the wine-soaked symposiums where democracy was born, alcohol has served as the invisible catalyst behind our species' greatest collaborative achievements. This isn't about celebrating excess or ignoring very real dangers, but understanding why humans across every culture and era have turned to intoxicants as tools for transcending biological limitations. The neuroscience reveals that moderate intoxication temporarily rewires our brains in ways that enhance creativity, increase trust, and enable cooperation with strangers—features that helped our ancestors build complex societies and continue driving innovation today. The key insight is that alcohol functions as social technology, requiring the same careful consideration we give to any powerful tool. Traditional cultures that integrated drinking into community rituals and social safeguards reaped enormous benefits, while modern societies that treat it as individual recreation often suffer devastating consequences. As we navigate an increasingly complex world demanding both creative innovation and global cooperation, we can learn from this ancient wisdom. The path forward lies not in eliminating intoxication from human experience, but in rediscovering how to harness its power safely and purposefully. By understanding why we get drunk and how it shaped our evolution, we can make wiser choices about when, how, and with whom we temporarily step outside ordinary consciousness to access the creative, connected, collaborative space that remains humanity's secret weapon for solving the challenges ahead.
By Edward Slingerland
